D&D General Styles of D&D Play

[Maxperson]

This entire discussion just comes down to a disagreement over what "supports" means, Minigiant is aware of this distinction as is Micah Sweet, they simply think that "supports" means more than, for example, "supports modding" in that it actually has a set of rules dedicated to it and is regularly maintained, rather than simply not disallowed.

The thing is, @Minigiant and the others are ignoring a whole lot of mechanical support for the various playstyles simply because it's not labeled, "Support for playstyle." For example, rogue and bard expertise is very strong mechanical support for the "Problem Solving" and "Political" styles, and decent support for "Character Driven." Bardic inspiration is good support for those as well.

Lots of spells, skills, feats, class/subclass abilities, etc. are tools that are good for one or more styles of play. That's support.

 

[Minigiant]

It kinda boggles my mind that people object to in-character roleplaying being important in a game that's in theory built around just that.

I don't thing anyone has objected to in-character roleplaying.

It's just that there are drawbacks to it compared to a more mechanical roleplay paradigm which is often denied.

---
But let's get to another playstyle. Survival.

We are playing a Survival game and the group wants to forage for food or track an fleeing ambusher.

There's many ways to do it.

1. You can do the classic method of all the players describing what their PCs are doing. Looking around. Recalling knowledge. The Players roleplay their PCs. The DM gives details on the environment based on their actions. And at the end, adjudicate their success.
2. You can do the official method. Which is (1) but at the end, the DM asks for a single check or group check to decide success.
3. You can do the complex method. Which is like (2) but after each player describes something, the DM calls for a check and adjusts the situation afterwards.
4. You can do the skill challenge. The DM describes a few actions the PCs can peform and which skills are related to them. The players describe their actions and suggest which skills or ability scores are related (Survial, Nature, Perception)). The DM calls for these checks and tallies the successes and failures to adjudicate their total success or failure.

Each method is a valid option. Each method has strengths and weaknesses.

1 and 2 both require players to fully know how to engage in the activity and allows for one player to dominate the event. Which is great if you only have 1 person excited about it (the ranger player) but bad if other players want to be involved but don't know how.

2 leans heavily on that 1 d20 roll. Which can be good or disastrous.

3 allows for a natural progression of actions and allows character stats to shine. But due to the d20, a bad roll can force an anticlimatic lockout. And it dosn't display a clear number of rolls need for sucess.

4 allows for every player to be involved and involved in a way befitting of their PC. And itallows for some gamism to weigh down the swingyness of the d20. But it requires a gamist structure and breaks the natural flowof conversation.

Each method having strengths and weaknesses.

 

[hgjertsen]

The thing is, @Minigiant and the others are ignoring a whole lot of mechanical support for the various playstyles simply because it's not labeled, "Support for playstyle." For example, rogue and bard expertise is very strong mechanical support for the "Problem Solving" and "Political" styles, and decent support for "Character Driven." Bardic inspiration is good support for those as well.

Lots of spells, skills, feats, class/subclass abilities, etc. are tools that are good for one or more styles of play. That's support.

I don't disagree but those class features do not, as far as I am aware, create a new mechanical system for resolving social interactions in a way that substantially changes how you play out social interactions except by augmenting number or quality of rolls. Not a problem for me, but maybe not what they mean.

 

[Maxperson]

I don't disagree but those class features do not, as far as I am aware, create a new mechanical system for resolving social interactions in a way that substantially changes how you play out social interactions except by augmenting number or quality of rolls. Not a problem for me, but maybe not what they mean.

Perhaps. I don't see a need for a completely new system in order for a style to be supported, though. I mean, if done well I wouldn't be against an optional system being released, but I'm not going to be asking for it. The styles are for the most part already decently supported if you take into consideration all the tools out there for them.

 

[Maxperson]

That's all I want.

Or jam it into a setting book.

Why isn't there a political intrigue setting yet?
Game of Thrones AND House of Dragon were popular.

You can't say "No body wanted that."

Hah! In my experience most people want it, but almost no one can run it well, even with rules dedicated to it. That much political intrigue is hard to pull off well.

 

[Minigiant]

The thing is, @Minigiant and the others are ignoring a whole lot of mechanical support for the various playstyles simply because it's not labeled, "Support for playstyle." For example, rogue and bard expertise is very strong mechanical support for the "Problem Solving" and "Political" styles, and decent support for "Character Driven." Bardic inspiration is good support for those as well.

Lots of spells, skills, feats, class/subclass abilities, etc. are tools that are good for one or more styles of play. That's support.

I'm not ignoring them.

The support exists.

I said the support is bad because its designed to support other plystyles nor the "Problem Solving" and "Political" styles

AKA you don;'t design the Exploration skills and spells the way D&D does for an Survival or Historic game. Or the social spells for a Political game. Those spells and skills were designed for Hack and Slash and Monty Haul.

This is why in the past D&D had to create splatbooks fulls of spells and magic items to counter the core spells.

 

[Maxperson]

Like I said....most gamers leave 5E after a time....no never game again. But there is always enough of an flow of new gamers in to replace them.

Where are your hard and reproduceable stats on this? I can't recall ever seeing or hearing anything that even hinted at this?

 

[Maxperson]

I said the support is bad because its designed to support other plystyles nor the "Problem Solving" and "Political" styles

AKA you don;'t design the Exploration skills and spells the way D&D does for an Survival or Historic game. Or the social spells for a Political game.

Why not? I fail to see how a tool that does 5 styles decently well is somehow bad simply because it was intended(and you haven't shown that) for only two of them.

 

[Hussar]

It would have given the character a greater chance of success, to be sure; but that by no means equates to "working better".

Because yes, every time that disguised character interacts with anyone new it really should require another check.

What that means is, every infiltration attempt will fail. Because the DM will simply keep throwing checks until one fails, and then the whole thing falls apart because every fail is a catastrophic failure. There are no degrees of failure. Did you fail your deception check? Yes, then the other person automatically sees through your disguise and raises the alarm.

Every.... single... time.

 

[Minigiant]

Hah! In my experience most people want it, but almost no one can run it well, even with rules dedicated to it. That much political intrigue is hard to pull off well.

This is because most people try to copy and paste other setting and other IP ideas onto D&D wholesale.


For example I have a Plotical Campaign game I ran/run that is tailored to D&D.

Each Faction is linked to and supported by a deity. As you gain favor with a faction, family, house, or relgion, you get points.

You know what those point are. Spell points.

And each deity as their own list of spells. Helping the House green lets you cast druid spells in a pinch. Aiding the king lets you get Oath of the Crown spells.

And your enemies and allies get points too. When the Master ofthe Forge betrays you after all those quests you did for him, that free action empowered fireball hurts.

"I told you he was Littlefinger! I never trusted that #$%&@!"